Lessons Learned

It was just a regular day in Chicago, Illinois for Da’sean a high school basketball player with a big and bright future ahead of him, but little did Da’sean know that his life was going to change very suddenly on this day.

Da’sean is a senior in high school and has a lot of scholarships for basketball. He is very popular around school but the people that he chooses to hang out with are not the best people. In fact, they are apart of a gang. Da’sean only hangs out with them when they're not doing any gang activity. Da Sean's mom has been telling him to not hang out with his “friends” because she is very suspicious about them, but Da’sean doesn’t pay attention to her or look at things from her perspective, so his mom always says that he’ll learn one way or another.

One day after school he went to hangout with his friends while his mom was at he mall shopping, but little did he know that they had some plans that night and he was going with them. So Troy, Marcus, Nick, Jaden and Da’sean all went to Kevin’s house. Troy is a tall and skinny boy who has a very bad temper and anger issues, Marcus is a big football player who is built like an ox and could be pretty intimidating at times, Nick is the scholar of the group but fell into some bad things with his brother Jaden who is a dropout, Kevin is the leader of the group, everyone obeys him and if he wanted to he could have all the other guys turn on one another because he has so much authority in the group. Kevin doesn’t really like Da’sean hanging out with his group because he’s not into all the gang activity, but he allows it because he knows how close Da’sean and Marcus are. Da’sean and Marcus have known each other since first grade, they grew up together, their moms know each other and are close, blood could not make them any closer than what they are now.

Everyone was just sitting down hanging out playing video games when all of Da’sean’s friends started talking about the gang from across town and how Kevin heard that the other gang was going to be at the mall tonight around 10. The conversation kind of just came up and then ended with no further discussion and Marcus went to the bathroom. So the boys went back to playing video games and Da’sean was having a pretty good time and then at about 8:45 they heard a car come down the street and all of the sudden shots started filling the air, rounds, after rounds, after rounds. Da’sean and the gang all laid low on the floor hoping that no one would get hit by a bullet. The bullets just kept coming and coming and coming. Da’seans heart was racing he wasn’t sure what was going on or what to do. After about a minute of shooting they heard about three car doors shut and the sound of car tires squealing around the corner and off into town. Da’sean and all the boys got up. Kevin was walking around the house cursing at the top of his lungs and got his phone and started calling someone. Da’sean started walking around to see if everyone was okay. He was walking around in each room calling everyone’s names then he walk in the bathroom to find Marcus laying on the floor. A wound in his back. Lying face down on the floor. Blood spilling everywhere on the floor. Da’sean just stood there teary-eyed, eyes full of anguish, regret and revenge.

Da’sean walked back into the other room where Kevin and the gang were sitting down planning. When he walked in they could tell something was wrong with Da’sean. They just stared at him and Da’sean said “They shot Marcus.” The gang wasn’t sure how to respond. “We’re going to get them back tonight,” Kevin said. “I want in,” Da’sean said. At first the group tried to convince Da’sean to just let them go and get the revenge but Da’sean said, “That was my brother and I would’ve let the bullet hit me before him…. I want in.” Once Kevin saw the anguish in Da’sean’s eyes he knew that they weren’t going to be able to change his mind. So Kevin took all of them to his basement, down in the basement there was a random trunk in the middle of the room. Kevin opened it up and handed each of them a gun and masks. These guns weren’t just any guns. If you looked at them you could tell that they were of high caliber. They were a nice and shiny silver, like they have never been used before, the silver sparkled in the light like the moon reflecting off of a lake. Once they got the guns the went into the garage and loaded up into two cars. They headed towards town to try to find the gang. While in the car nobody said a word. They were all full of anger and revenge and they all knew what they were going to do and that it had to be done.

Once they were in town they went to one of the gang members houses. They all got out of the cars and broke into the house. Once they saw that no one was home they ransacked the house stealing all of the valuable items. They stole anything that they could get their hands on. Then they got back into the cars and Kevin brought up how he heard the gang was going to the mall at 10. So they headed to the mall. They put their guns in the waistline of their pants. While all of this is going on Da’sean’s heart just keeps beating faster and faster and faster. The only reason he’s doing this is because he feels like he owes it to Marcus. Kevin and his gang go throughout the mall searching every store, but staying low key about it. Then while they were coming out of a store they saw the other gang going up an escalator. Kevin told his gang to wait a couple seconds for them to clear the escalator and then they would follow behind them. So they wait a couple of seconds, put on their masks and run up the escalator. The other gang is about fifty or so yards ahead of them. They all pull their guns out and open fire. Everyone is running screaming for their life’s. Some people are running towards the bullets because they don’t know where they’re coming from. Da’sean has his gun out and he has a perfect shot at who he could get. He hesitates, contemplating on whether or not he really wants to do this. So many emotions were running through his mind. He imagined everything that him and Marcus went through. Them playing football together, playing basketball with each other, one time when they got sneaking out and came back and got yelled at, then he pictured Marcus’s body face down in Kevin’s bathroom. Blood everywhere. Da’sean closed his eyes. Took a deep breath and he pulled the trigger four times. The first two bullets missed one went off into nowhere and the second one hit a citizen that was trying to run away, but the last two hit the other gang member. Da’sean heard police sirens. Him and all the other gang members ran, but Da’sean ran a different way than the gang. Da’sean went out of the mall the back way and ran all the way home. When he got home he was huffing and puffing like he had just ran a marathon without a hint of water. So a couple minutes go by and he is sitting on his couch and he realizes that his mom isn’t home. He begins to worry but calms down and decides to just wait for her to get home. After about two whole hours of waiting and worrying he gets a call from his grandma. She tells him that his mom has been shot. With so many emotions running through his head he doesn’t even know what to think. So he heads out to the hospital and goes to the front desk and and he asked for the room number his moms in and they gave it to him. He goes into the hallway and finds her room. He walks in and his heart sinks. He never thought that he would be sitting in a room looking at his mom with an IV in her and a bunch of other wires attached to her. He really doesn’t know what to say. He asked what happened and she told him how she was in the mall and these gunmen started shooting and she got hit by a stray bullet. At that moment Da’sean’s face looked like he just saw a ghost. He knew that he was the one who had shot his mom, but he just didn’t know how to tell her. So he sat there in silence for a couple of minutes until he built up the courage to tell her. Once he told her his mom started crying. She was trying to think where she went wrong raising him. Da’sean didn’t know what to say. He sat there teary eyed and walked out and went home. The next day his mom came home and as soon as she got in the door Da’sean gave her a hug and started crying she asked him if he learned his lesson and he said yes and that he didn’t know why he did what he did but it could’ve destroyed his life forever. Da’sean learned his lesson. After that day he never affiliated with that group of guys again. He ended up going division 1 for basketball and then played overseas and spoiled his mother every chance he got.